Eyes, Blind and Broken
by LifesVictory
Summary: Samantha faces the threat of a psychological breakdown and is haunted by the face of a murderer that binds her subconscious to fear. Can she let go of her obsession before it consumes her? Some JSR later.
1. Chapter 1

I put my arms instinctively around my shoulders and stood across from him, watching silently. Suddenly, the protective one-way mirror of the interrogation room did not provide me nearly the same amount of security as it had years before. I shivered asI watched the murder slide into the room with a smug look stretched on his sharp features and clatter down on the wooden chair, legs spread and back slouched. Martin stood across from him and wrote something down on his report when the murder slowly turned and looked directly into the mirror and straight into my eyes. I gasped and stumbled backward, caught off-guard. Jack and Vivian heard my reaction and turned to where I stood.

"Are you alright?" Vivian asked, frowning. I understood her confusion. Never once in my whole career had I flinched at a convict, murder or common thief. However, as I looked at the man who smirked at me with a sadistic grin on the other side of the glass, I felt my body tremble uncontrollably. "Sam?" I placed my fingertips on my mouth and drummed them nervously on my upper lip.

"I'm fine," I stuttered. Vivian opened her mouth to continue but decided against it. Jack, however, watched me strangely and I shook off his gaze. "Go ahead. I just need a little air." The murderer who had raped and killed three young girls without any mercy whatsoever turned back to Martin and I escaped from the room, gasping for breath.

I grabbed my coat and punched the elevator button, riding down to ground level. I welcomed the calming noise of the busy sidewalk as I threw open the building doors and leaned against the wall. I sank down onto a bench and sat there for a while. The man's eyes were emblazoned on my mind and wouldn't leave. I rubbed my eyes with the heel of my palms until they were red and irritated. I couldn't afford to be acting like this at the beginning of a new case. I needed concentration. Total focus. Unconditional vigilance—

"Sam?" I jumped and nearly fell off of the bench as I heard Jack's voice appear out of nowhere. I steadied myself once again and looked up at his face which was shadowed against the dark gray sky.

"Jesus," I whispered, fumbling in my pocket for a cigarette, my first in years. He watched me quietly as I struggled to light the tobacco-filled end as the flame in my lighter flickered out once, twice, three times before he offered his own.

"You don't smoke," he observed. I snorted and breathed out the smoke through my nose, savoring the nicotine that rushed through my veins.

"You didn't know me six years ago," I chortled. "Pack a day at least. Nervous habit, I guess." Jack moved from his position at the wall and sat down beside me. I offered him a cigarette and he shook his head.

"I quit for the kids," he explained and I nodded respectively. After a pause he looked up at me and frowned. "What happened to you in there?" I took a drag on the cigarette to stall some time but he continued to stare at me expectantly and I was forced to answer.

"I don't know Jack," I answered him shortly. "Christ, I'm human aren't I? I'm allowed to screw up once in awhile, aren't I?" He held up his hands passively and turned to watching the street blankly. His silence only perturbed me more and I took a long breath on the cigarette before flicking it angrily on the sidewalk and crushing it with my foot. "I just froze, I guess. That man murdered three girls and has one captive in his demented world somewhere where we can't find her, where we can't be sure if she's even…" I let my hands drop to my sides, not realizing I had lifted them to begin with.

"We can't actually be sure if he's the one who committed those murders, Sam," he said with reluctance. I laughed bitterly and turned to him.

"Jack, I was there! I was the one who handled the case as a rookie! Hell, you even saw the blood stains on his walls! He ripped them apart. Raped them, pissed on them, and just ripped them apart, and yet you can sit there and tell me that he's a fucking innocent?" A couple people stared as I stood up in an angry outrage and paced along the sidewalk before a sudden wave of dizziness caused me to grope for the wall to support myself. Jack stood and gripped my arm until the feeling had passed. I wrenched my arm away from his. I needed to be angry with someone. I hated not being able to do or say anything more than neutral to the sons of a bitch who came into our office daily, and Jack, who bore it all with such placid nonchalance, was the recipient of my rage.

"Sam, please—"

"And who the hell are you to act all high and mighty anyway, Jack? You go day in and day out with that somber, steely, justice-be-done shit and act like you don't even give a fuck about who we find and who we don't! Don't you care? Don't you have any reaction? Jesus Christ, Jack, we're dealing with a man who _knows_ he's got blood on his hand, _revels_ in the fact that he ripped life out of them all, and you think it's _noble_, what you're doing? Vivian's not the only one who knows your past, Jack. I don't even need to know. I don't know what's worse, feeling all the hate that I do, or keeping it locked inside like it doesn't even fucking exist like you do!"

I watched his face, panting, waiting for a reaction. He stared into my eyes with stony eyes that I couldn't read with the intensity that radiated from them. After a moment, I gave up when I realized he wasn't going to react at all.

"Fine," I muttered, "Fine." I turned and walked away from him before suddenly turning around. "You know what? Maybe it's me. Maybe there's something wrong with me, but I don't know how you can sleep at night without them all breathing down you necks. Maybe I'm too fucked up for this job. Shit, there's always a desk job in Nebraska totally free from emotional attachment I would be perfect for."

I spun back around and blindly stumbled forward into the crowd. I could barely hear the din that resounded around me as the blood throbbed in my ears. People's faces turned into pale, solid blurs. And I suddenly felt lost in the city I had grown up in. My chest heaved in panic as I ran faster and faster through the crowd until my lungs burst in frustration and fear. A scream was building in my chest as the anxiety grew to phobia inside of me. I fell backwards in fear, waiting for the pavement to envelop me and instead collapsed into two arms.

"Oh, Jack," I shuddered, as my shoulders heaved. He stood there silently, holding me awkwardly in his arms while the city buzzed around us.


	2. Chapter 2

I woke up on a familiar leather couch with my face smashed against its stiff back and legs dangling off the side. I pried my skin from the leather and felt my cheek which was imprinted with the pattern of the wrinkled jacket I had slept in. Slowly, I sat up and immediately was greeted by the dull, throbbing head ache and nausea of a hangover. Wait. I squeezed my eyes shut and swallowed before glancing down at my clothes…which were, to my extreme relief, still on my body. I had leaned by head back against the wall when the door to the quiet office swung open. Jack, not noticing me, walked straight to his desk and began to sit down before seeing that I was awake and jumping back up again.

"You're awake," he observed in a hoarse voice that sounded as if a bad cold was settling on his chest. I nodded grimly, trying to stand up. After a few attempts of which I was grateful that Jack did not try to help me, I was standing and straightening my rumpled clothes. "I didn't think you'd regain consciousness for at least a couple hours." He managed a quick smile. "I guess you can hold your liquor." _Liquor._ What had I _done_ last night?

"Jack?" I coughed, rubbing my forehead with one hand while the other rested on my hip. "What did I—how did I get here? Did I…get drunk?" Something on his face flickered and I just barely saw it. He frowned.

"Do you not remember?" I shook my head slowly, the sinking feeling in my stomach escalading. He crossed the room and stood so that we met shoulder to shoulder, and whispered into my ear. "You made sounds I've never heard a woman make before." My face burned though it blanched to a ghostly pale as I stumbled backwards, gaping open-mouthed. His face was serious and intense, and as I felt a tingling sensation along the tips of my fingers, he suddenly broke into a tired grin that hid something that he was struggling to keep repressed and walloped my shoulder roughly. My heart resumed normal functions and I glared at him angrily.

"Go to hell," I hissed as he handed me a steaming cup of coffee. I eyed it suspiciously before taking it from him. "This isn't spiked, is it?" Jack shook his head and returned to his desk, sitting on his chair. I sipped from it and it was surprisingly good for black coffee. "But honestly, Jack. What happened last night? I—I got pretty shaken yesterday and I can't remember a thing." I ran my fingers through my hair until they caught in a series of knots half-way down my scalp. He interlaced his fingers and looked at me straight in the eye.

"You _did_ get drunk," he began, and I winced. "We went to McAllister's around four in the afternoon and stayed there until about twelve." He saw my surprised look and nodded. "And then I realized I had no idea where you lived and just took you back to my office. So, here you are." I downed the rest of the coffee, finally awake and conscious, and stood up. However, something dawned on me and I looked at Jack curiously.

"You stayed here all night?" I asked incredulously. He shrugged and went back to the file he was analyzing.

"So were you," he mumbled offhandedly. I nodded at his vagueness and shuffled out of the office. Vivian smiled at me from the cubicles where she was lecturing a rookie, and mouthed _are-you-feeling-better?_ to which I waved yes. I slid over to my office and managed to barricade myself in it without getting caught in Martin's gaze which I knew was following me to a tee.

I sighed once I sliced the slats of my Venetian blinds to a close and flicked on my desk lamp. Kicking open my closet, I took out the spare dress suit and blouse that I kept there for emergencies. After I changed I brushed my hair and splashed water over my groggy features until I could manage to call myself awake. I heard a knock at my door and opened it reluctantly. Danny stood in the threshold of the door and, taking one look at me, burst out laughing. I punched him and took the interrogation report that he handed me. I barely managed to suppress the wave of nausea that overcame me when I thought of the man who had brought on my breakdown yesterday.

"Vivian wants you to go over these when you get a chance," he informed me, sliding his hands in his pockets. "The NYPD have him under tight surveillance at the State Penitentiary, and you can set up another interview with him through Vivian." _If you're up to it_. I saw him biting back these words and looked away.

"Thanks, Dan," I said, forcing a cheery smile. However, he looked down and shifted his weight; there was more. "Something else?"

"Yeah," he answered, taking a deep breath and letting it hiss out through his teeth before handing me a note which I read frantically. "Sam, don't get angry, it's really for the—" The paper fell from my fingers which I found I couldn't stop from shaking.

"They want to put me in an asylum?" I whispered in a low voice which shook in fear and anger. "I break down _once_ and they want to put me away? I've been here eight years and never once, never_ once_, have I fucked up a case and the minute I hesitate I get shipped off?" I turned and paced the room, spots blotching at my vision. Danny entered the room and shut the door behind him.

"Sam, I—"

"How do I deserve this? It isn't even that serious! If you were face to face with a cold-blooded murderer, would you flinch? _Would_ you?" He watched me, trying to empathize desperately, I could tell.

"Sam, listen to me," he grabbed my shoulders gently and squeezed nervously. "I'm not supposed to really say this, but it's not just today. This is for all the other times it's happened, too. I mean, maybe it could help you, you know? It's not permanent…" I threw his hand off of me.

"Other times?" I repeated, my voice breaking in confusion.Danny sighed, and I knew I was making it difficult for him, but I didn't care. I wanted to know what was going on.

"They weren't as serious as today's, that's why it wasn't such a big ordeal…"

"Danny, what other times?" I demanded sharply. He shook his head sorrowfully, and watched me.

"You really don't remember, do you," he murmured regretfully, eyes troubled. "Sam, you've done this eight times over the past thirteen months. It's just…this is the first time that you've actually had an attack. And this is the first time you've remembered." I froze, my mind struggling to grasp the lunacy that Danny was insisting was truth. My comprehension stuck on something he said.

"Attack?" He nodded, and I laughed in a strange voice, shaking my head. "No, see, that's where you're wrong. I was with Jack all night. I got drunk. I got drunk, Danny! I had a fucking hangover!" Danny ran a hand through his hair and looked intensely into my eyes.

"You didn't finish reading the summons," I picked the paper which had fallen to the floor up and scanned the remaining parts, not knowing what I was looking for. However, as Danny explained to me, my eyes froze on the signature requesting and permitting my admission to the Psychological Ward in Winchester. "Jack signed your release, Sam. He's the one who's been covering for you when you go through these things, but even he knows that this is getting serious."

Pure, agonizing fear plunged through me and pulsed along my veins. However, as the realization of what was happening dawned on me, the fear evolved into phobic anger. I threw open the door, ignoring Danny's pleas and saw Vivian's downcast gaze focused guiltily on the floor. I stormed over to Jack's office, aware of the silence that echoed throughout the building. I banged open Jack's door and flew into it. He looked up, eyes darkened but shut off from emotion. I held the letter in my hand which I held suspended before me, shaking and terrified.

"You," I stammered. "You knew. You _lied_ to me, you son of a bitch! I can't believe you! How could you do this?" Suddenly, three men dressed neutrally in gray suits entered his office and took hold of my arms. I struggled vainly, kicking my legs and straining away from them as they bound my arms behind my back. "What are they doing to me, Jack? Where are they taking me? Jack, please. Please! Make them stop! Tell them to stop…." I trailed off emptily, my eyes filling with tears of surrender.

Jack was watching me with a face that was steadily breaking down from its stolid expression. The men waited for a response, but lead me from the office when there was none. I followed limply, still in dumb shock, keeping my eyes focused on the floor as everyone else's bore straight through me. They led me into the elevator and said something in a quiet whisper into my ear before injecting a needle into my arm. Suddenly, I saw Jack burst from his office and shout my name, his voice raw with feeling. However, blood rushed in my ears and I heard nothing, and soon fell away into darkness.


	3. Chapter 3

"Miss Spade, you have a phone call!"

My head jerked abruptly from my shoulder where I had fallen into an uncomfortable sleep. A nurse behind me was smiling gaily and began to steer my wheelchair from its place by the window back over to the caged contraption they called a bed. She offered me a plastic phone attached by several yards of cord, and I stared at it apprehensively.

"Miss Spade?" I shook myself and took the phone from her hands. She stood with her arms crossed, watching me for a moment before it was clear that I wouldn't be saying anything with her in the room. "Very well," she sighed, and left. Waiting until I had heard the door click shut and was very much alone, I lifted the phone, which was shaking in my fingers, to my ear.

"Hello?" I rasped hoarsely. My throat was sore from allergies and sounded as if I was sixty years old. I heard a stifled sob on the other end of the line and recognized my mother's voice. I slumped back into my wheelchair, automatically casting my thoughts elsewhere.

"Good morning, Samantha" she quavered tearfully. After a pause, I realized I was expected to answer.

"Good morning, Ma," I replied.

"How are you feeling?" My mother took a brave stab at conversation

"Fine. You?"

"Oh, just fine. Getting over a cold, that's all."

"Well, it's that time of the year."

"Yes, it is," she replied enthusiastically. I fingered the cord blankly and picked at the _Property of Winchester Psychiatric Facilities_ sticker which was stuck on the wall. "Your father's garden is blooming. Yesterday, I swore I saw a tomato plant just about to blossom. Mrs. Leonard said that he should enter it into the fair this summer. You should come by if you…feel…you know…_up_ to it." I felt a pang of something grab at my insides and sat up in the chair.

"Ma, what is it you want?" I said more sharply than I'd intended. I heard the emotion build up behind her voice and was tempted just to hang up the phone and end all contact.

"Just…" She whispered in a trembling voice. "I mean, it will take as long as it takes, sweetheart. We're all…praying for you." I felt my heart pounding sickly and cringed at what they all must think of me as now. My throat constricted so that I couldn't speak. Finally, I heard her end of the line click and a conclusive dial tone blared into my ears. The nurse re-entered my room and crossed over to where I sat. She pried the phone from my stiff fingers and looked down at me curiously.

"How is your mother, Miss Spade?" She asked in a cheerfully neutral voice. "Is she doing well?" I swallowed the knot in my throat and blinked my stinging eyes.

"She's just getting over a cold," I managed to whisper. The nurse nodded and threw back the curtains to my room. A gloomy mix of post-rain mist and gray skies welcomed me.

"Seventy acres of farmland and two stables and not a soul on my floor bothers to ride those poor horses," she frowned sadly to occupy the silence. "Why don't you go for a ride, Miss Spade? I'm sure I could arrange it with Dr. Aldersyde." I looked away from the window. "Oh, you don't know how to ride, do you? Don't worry, the horses are as gentle as anything. They're therapy ponies, you know. Won't hurt a soul."

I felt a strange urge to hurl my pillow at her to silence the nasal voice which grated on my ears daily. "Is Dr. Aldersyde coming today?" I asked instead of the man who had been studying and analyzing me for the past few months. The nurse nodded before heading towards the clipboard she kept at the end of my bed.

"Any minute now, Miss Spade," she chirped. I prepared myself for the list of questions I was asked everyday to determine the state of my mental health. Clenching my teeth, I closed my eyes as she began.

"Have you felt any panic today?"

"No."

"Has anything caused you to resort to anger?"

"No."

"Is your digestive system functioning uncomfortably?"

"No."

"Have you had any thoughts of death today?"

"No."

"Is there anything today that you can't remember happening?"

"No."

"Memory faults?"

"No."

"Any fits or convulsions?"

"Just a couple." The nurse wrenched her head upwards, and I smiled weakly. The corners of her chapped lips twitched in annoyance. She finished checking off boxes on her tablet and smiled brightly before returning it to its place at my bed.

"Doctor Aldersyde will be in any minute." She finished coldly before exiting the room. I saw her rolling her eyes to another nurse outside my room before shuffling away.

The bitter amusement I felt earlier faded away into a sudden loneliness. I looked outside the window. Several horses grazed absently in the field adjacent to my room. Winchester, Virginia really was a beautiful place. Or it would be, were I not in an asylum.

My fingers traveled across my lap and below the seat of my wheelchair where I stored a small journal that I was instructed at the beginning of my session to write in. At first I wrote the least possible, but to my surprise, the words sort of fell out of me as my hands moved across the page. I turned to the last page I had written on and took out a pen, but just as I pressed the nib to the page, the door swung open and a thirty-something doctor with premature salt-and-pepper hair entered with a quick knock on the threshold.

"Good morning, Sam," he said in greeting. I shoved the journal back underneath my seat and sneezed as the allergies overcame me again. He offered me a tissue and I took it. This doctor, of the twenty so who had analyzed me, was the one, if one had to be chosen, that I disliked the least. If for any reason, because he called me "Sam," not "Miss Spade" or "Miss Samantha."

"Morning," I sighed, my eyes traveling outside again. He sat down across from me and watched my face with a quiet smile.

"Something on your mind, Sam?" I looked at him. It was the same question he'd been asking me for three months. And each time I'd answer him with the same response: "Nothing worth mentioning." Today, however, I stared back out the window and before I could stop myself, blurted out:

"I want to go home, Doctor." He paused in mild surprise and sighed, removing his glasses from his face.

"I know, Sam." I snorted and turned to face him, twirling my fingers along the sleeve of my sweater.

"Do you? Then why the hell am I shut up in this room? I haven't had one bloody … _attack_ in six months, and yet I'm still stuck here. I just want to go home! I swear I won't do it again, I swear to God. I hate it here. I _hate_ it…" My voice trailed off pathetically into silence. I didn't have to look up into his face to know what the answer. I sighed. "Haven't I made any progress, Doctor?"

He stirred from the position he had been in while he was listening to me and took my file from his clipboard. He flipped through it and I watched him with a tired anxiousness.

"I can't deny that the recovery you made to your latest collapse has been quite remarkable, and you are displaying promising signs of improvement," Doctor Aldersyde said, his voice hesitant. After a moment, he looked up and sighed at my intent face. "Sam, you have to understand: you are here because you've been experiencing reoccurring mental breakdowns for the past _year and a half_. That isn't something you can just fix with a syringe and a couple meetings with a shrink twice a year. This may be your chance to end all of this, Sam! Don't you see? Something in this last attack triggered your memory. There was _something_ different than the others because you could _remember_ it. You knew something had happened!"

I swallowed and continued to watch his face, more alive now than it had been in the past stolid months. He gripped my hands.

"Sam, I can't do this alone," he told me seriously. "The sooner you admit that there is something wrong, the closer you'll be to leaving this behind. I _can_ help you, Sam. I swear to you, I will get you through this, but I need you to recognize that something in you needs to be fixed."

I shuddered, feeling very much like a delinquent and less and less sure of the difference between what he was saying and what I was thinking. He let go of my hands which were trembling and ran his fingers through his hair. "I'm not even supposed to be this far ahead of myself in your treatment. Six months is very early in a case like this. But…" He paused and watched me gravely. "If you promise me that the second this becomes too much for you, you will inform me and we can moderate your therapy, I am willing to try…to get you out of here as soon as I can." My heart thumped rapidly in my chest and I jerked suddenly.

"I swear," I breathed. We sat there, doctor and patient, for a good minute before either of us said a word. He stood and sighed, sliding his hands into his pockets.

"It won't be easy," he told me weakly. I rose from my chair, a little queasy from the medicine I had been regularly administered. "You can't underestimate this, Sam."

"I understand," I responded quietly. He took up his clipboard decisively and crossed the room to leave.

"We'll begin tomorrow," he said, his hands on the doorknob. "Early. 7:30, or so. I'll have one of my nurses come for you. I think your personal aid could use a …vacation." A shadow of a smile showed through on my lips and he returned the gesture. I heard the door close and sank back down into my chair. Whatever it was he wanted, I would give him. All of the self-pity and disgust I had wallowed in for the past six months suddenly gave way to a sharp clarity that filled my mind. I was ready.


	4. Chapter 4

When I woke the next morning, it was still dark outside and even the therapy horses hadn't yet roused themselves for day. I clambered out of the death-trap bed, wrapped a robe around myself, and shuffled over to the window. I nearly tripped over the wheelchair I was forced to use and kicked it weakly out of the way. Barely visible over the small hill which separated the patient bedrooms and the staffs' cabins, I could see a young woman leaving her room. She smoothed her skirts and walked along the sidewalk which led all the way around to the other end of the Psyche ward. I guessed she was the nurse whom Dr. Aldersyde had spoken of, coming to fetch me. I should get dressed.

Slowly, I slid my boxers and tee-shirt off of my shivering frame and squeezed into a pair of old jeans my mother had sent me in the mail when she heard I was staying here indefinitely. I was not allowed to do my daily mile-or-so jog in the morning as I had done for years, and I could feel my body weakening significantly, especially the waistline. When I had a turtleneck and vest on me, I sat on my bed quietly, fingers toying with a plush keychain I had ripped from my purse the day they took me.

_I miss him._

The thought washed over me with a wave of uneasiness, and my fingers paused. At first I thought of Martin, which was expected, I suppose, seeing as I had been seeing him pretty exclusively before the attacks. But his face did not fit the shadowy image in my mind. Frowning, I tried to think of who it was until suddenly, I realized.

_Jack._ The name escaped my lips in the form of a sigh, and I pummeled my temples with my fists. I can't deal with that now. Concentration, I reminded myself, concentration. And yet, the thought of his haggard voice shouting my name before I fell into unconsciousness was emblazoned in my memory. With an abrupt screech, the bedroom door swung open and the young nurse jumped to see I was already awake, dressed, and waiting patiently on my bed.

"Good morning," she stammered, recomposing herself. I stared at her blankly before shaking myself out of the daze I had fallen into. "If you're all ready, I can go ahead and take you to Dr. Aldersyde, if you like." I stood up and nodded before reaching for my wheelchair. "Dr. Aldersyde says you won't be needing that today, unless you think you require it."

Pausing in surprise, I pushed it behind me and gave the girl a look as if to say, _you've got to be kidding me. _She smiled and indicated for me to follow her. We exited my room, and I turned to the left automatically as I had done for the past six months. However, I stopped when I realized she was going in a different direction.

"We'll be going to the right today, Miss Spade," she said gently before taking my arm with a light hand and swiveling me down the right hallway. When we had reached the end of the passage and pushed open the _Exit Only_ door where the hall terminated, I realized why I had never gone down this way before. I stepped out of the hall and, feeling the moist chill of morning seep into my clothes, and halted to hear the soft swishing of tails and occasional nicker of thirteen therapy horses in their stalls.

"What are we…?" I began hesitantly. Suddenly, I saw Dr. Aldersyde appear from the inside of the barn with knee-high riding boots over his blue jeans. In his hands were a pair of riding chaps and a helmet. I backed away. "Oh…._no_." He smiled and walked over to where I was standing safely on the other side of the paddock fence.

"Good morning," he greeted me with a knowing expression, "are you ready for your first session of treatment, Sam?" I looked at him with narrowed eyes.

"Doctor, when you said 'advanced therapy' yesterday, I had something in mind like whitewashed walls and analysis of my past. Not," I eyed the stalls suspiciously. "_horseback riding_." He laughed and opened the gate to the paddock, forcing me inside.

"Sam," he said in a suddenly quiet voice that made me shiver. "Please understand that if you'd like to back away from this idea, if it's too much…" I inhaled deeply and shook my head.

"I'm sick, Doc," I whispered, shuddering as the words, now spoken, seemed to actualize the truth, "I'll do whatever it takes. Even…horseback riding." He chuckled lightly and helped me to climb over the fence.

"How does it feel?" Dr. Aldersyde asked as we walked towards the barn. I turned and frowned at his inquiry.

"What?" I responded, leaning against the stall door to zip up the chaps he had handed me.

"Admitting to something you can't control." Dr. Aldersyde smiled thoughtfully before disappearing into the shadow of the barn. I stared blankly after him before grabbing the stubborn zipper stuck at my thigh and pulling it upwards. I yelped, however, and my eyes watered as I felt my skin pinch against its cold metal. The nurse fixed it quickly and removed the white coat she wore, revealing a pair of riding pants and a sweater.

"Have you ever ridden before, Miss Spade?" She asked politely, taking my arm and leading me through rows and rows of empty stalls, each with a corresponding saddle and bridle hanging from a post outside their doors. I shrugged.

"I used to ride when I was little," I murmured, running my hands over the worn leather of each saddle as I passed them. "Don't anymore. I had to sell my horse when I got my first…" _Job._ I swallowed and the nurse knew not to press me anymore.

Finally, we reached the other end of the barn which opened up into a wide, spanning landscape that made me gasp. It was raw beauty, to give it the credit it deserved. As far as I could see, long grass and tall, ancient trees loomed wet and dewy in the morning light. Not a soul seemed to be within two-hundred acres of the barn except for me, Dr. Aldersyde, and the nurse. I had to brush away a layer of moisture which had accumulated surprisingly along my eyelashes. There was something about this place which I had seen before.

"What are you thinking?" Dr. Aldersyde asked. I shrugged and shook my head wordlessly.

"It's beautiful," I whispered lamely. I strained to identify the memory with the strange familiarity which was somehow associated with the scene. I pursed my lips too obviously, and he noticed.

"Sam?"

"Nothing," I shrugged again, "It's nothing. I just…it looks sort of familiar to me, that's all." He frowned and nodded to the nurse who discreetly scribbled something down in a notebook. Their eyes bore too eagerly into the back of my head and I quickly turned to the small group of horses gathered around a mound of hay.

"Pick one," Dr. Aldersyde suggested, already laying a saddle pad over the back of a short, fat pony. "They're all very gentle, I assure you." I examined the rest of them and glanced eye to eye with a tall, bay gelding. I lifted its according saddle from its peg and walked over to the horse with a deep breath.

"Do you need help?" Dr. Aldersyde asked, sliding the bit of his bridle into his pony's mouth. I shook my head secured the saddle and bridle into place on the animal. Dr. Aldersyde trotted over to me and squinted out into the fog.

"Let's just take it slow today," he decided with a hint of uneasiness in his voice. I swung my leg over the horse's back and felt a familiar rush of adrenaline I remembered as a kid tingle through me. "Shall we try a brisk walk over to the—" Suddenly, I spurred the horse into motion and galloped away from the poor doctor. "—brook."

I could feel the astonished eyes following me as I sped faster and faster over the terrain. My stomach was filled with a light, airy feeling that I embraced as the smooth rocking motion beneath me lengthened as the horse stretched its stride. I steered it upwards onto a plateau-like surface atop the hill before turning around and staring, out of breath, back at the distance I had traveled. My chest was heaving in exhilaration as Dr. Aldersyde finally caught up to me on his short, little pony.

"Right," he breathed, cheeks bright pink. "Well, glad you enjoyed that. It's good you're moving about…I thought maybe we'd have to perform this on foot…" He looked over his shoulder and past me, and I frowned. His brow, I noticed from years of observation, was tense and beaded with sweat. He was hiding something. My hand lifted unconsciously to my gun holster which I remembered with a wave of discomfort wasn't there.

"Dr. Aldersyde, what's going on?" I asked in a low, wary voice. His eyes turned back to face me, and I noticed his pupils had shrunk to pinpricks in their blue settings. "Dr. Aldersyde…"

"Listen, Sam," he explained in a hushed voice. "I told you this wouldn't be easy, didn't I? I told you when it got to be too much to tell me, didn't I? I warned you that the time span you were hoping for was _nearly_ impossible, didn't I?" I tried to speak but he cut me off. "I've never done this before, Sam. Never have. It's something that even the institute doesn't yet approve of, but what experiments we've carried out with this method, it _can_ be the most effective." He paused. "However, direct confrontation poses a fatality rate that we haven't quite smoothed out…"

"Dr. Aldersyde, what the hell is going on?" I repeated intensely. It was too quiet for this time of morning. I heard no birds, no voices, just silence.

"Oh, shit," he whispered, hands shaking. "I should have called it off. I should have stopped it…this isn't _right_…this isn't _moral_…"

Then, it all happened at once.

I felt an impossibly strong blow sweep me from my seat as the horse started and galloped away. Dr. Aldersyde had disappeared, horse and all, and I was left alone on the wet grass. A soft thud by my head caused me to whip around and see what had fallen. A small, silver revolver lay nestled in the grass and I grabbed it instinctively, trying to ignore the disabling confusion which was clouding my mind. I threw myself to the side as a large stone was hurled toward me, and scrambled to my feet.

"Get up," a rough, terrifying voice growled menacingly. I held the gun tightly in my nearly expert fingers and aimed forward. I looked forward and was greeted by the round mouth of a pistol pointed directly toward me.

"What the hell…?" I hissed, searching around for Dr. Aldersyde, though I knew I wouldn't find him. Suddenly, a phrase he had stuttered before the attack flashed back through my mind. _Direct confrontation poses a fatality rate that we haven't quite smoothed out…_Direct confrontation. I almost smirked at the thought that the horses were the most I'd be dealing with today. The man seemed to be waiting for my move, and I rotated my head slightly to get a glimpse of the face of the attacker. Of course, it was hidden by a ski mask.

Then, I kicked out and the man recoiled in pain. I ran in the opposite direction to where I saw my horse grazing in the nearby patch of grass. I could hear the man's heavy footfalls chasing me as I leapt from a large stone onto the animal's back. However, the man's footfalls quickened drastically, and I turned to see he was miraculously on horseback as well. I spurred the animal faster and hugged to the wet land as best as I could as I rounded a curve. He followed. I twisted in a difficult weaving pattern of figure eights and spirals until I could not hear him behind me anymore. Finally, when I had reached an open area of field and I felt the evident danger was less, I slowed and turned around, gun aimed before me. No one was there.

I sagged in relief. What the hell _was_ this? I thought as my chest heaved in exhaustion. I patted the animal briskly and slumped my shoulders as my breathing slowed. Where was the doctor? It was over; I had won.

"Doctor Alder—" The breath was knocked out of me as a body collided with mine from above. The attacker had dropped from a tree above me and had wrestled me off the rearing horse and onto the ground. He reached for my neck and I punched as hard as I could between his legs. He flinched and for a moment, his grasp lessened and I took advantage of the weakness. I struck out against the back of his neck, at his pressure point, but he caught my wrist with a wide hand. He forced me to the ground with incredible strength and pinned me against the wet grass. I whimpered as he raised his fist to hit my stomach. I could see the whites of his eyes and suddenly lurched forward, slipping the revolver from my belt with lightning speed and aiming it between his eyes. He froze and I toppled him backwards.

"Bastard," I panted breathlessly. I pressed the mouth of the gun into his head and pressed the trigger with my thumb. However, a sudden wave of nausea spread through me. Dizziness caused a black shadow to cut in around my vision. _Shoot._ My hands were sweating. What the hell? _Shoot. Shoot. Shoot._ I told myself desperately. The man was not moving, but I felt as if I was falling backwards. A strange whistling echoed through my ears which was disgustingly familiar. The day they came. The nausea. I remembered the nausea. I thought I had been drunk the day before, but it was different. _This _was different. _Shootshootshootshootshoot…_ I chanted feebly. The gun fell from my hands, and the attacker whipped off his mask. I barely recognized one of the men who had taken me the day after my final collapse before I fell into unconsciousness.

They told me the next morning the last thing I had whispered was a single word.

_Jack._


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: Still don't own any of the characters having to do with _Withouta Trace_, nor do I have any financial claims with CBS or its affiliates. Or if I do, am still waiting for the inheritance from rich grandfather who happened to own CBS thirty years ago. I can still hope, can't I?

A/N: Okay, I'm about halfway through this thing, maybe a little more, so I'm just taking a quick minute to say thanks to all my reviewers and to warn yall about this next chapter. It's a little vicious at the end.

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When my eyes finally opened a few hours later, I bleary looked into the faces of a circle of familiar people standing around the couch I was sprawled upon. Dr. Aldersyde, his nurses, and the attacker all watched me with a curious strangeness. I jolted upwards onto my elbows when I saw the man who attacked me and was instantly detained by Dr. Aldersyde hands setting me back onto my upright pillow

"Are you insane?" I hissed, glaring at Dr. Aldersyde and clenching one of his wrists in my hand. I was more afraid and unsettled than angry, but he didn't need to know that. "I could have been killed! What were you thinking? When I agreed to controversial treatment, I didn't think it would threaten my _life_, Dr. Aldersyde. I don't remember ever consenting to this yesterday on that lovely little pre-battle trail ride, thank you! In fact—"

"But the point is," he began with a relieved, almost happy look smeared across his face, "you _remembered._" I stopped talking, but my mouth fell open slightly, making me look like an extremely dried out fish.

"What?" I breathed. He motioned to the nurses and they backed away from us. The doctor grasped my hands.

"Don't you get it, Sam?" He whispered eagerly, "You _remembered_! In all your other attacks except for the one which sent you here, you would wake up the next morning feeling fine and totally unaware of what happened the day before! But, here you are, three hours later, with a clear memory of what you went through." He gave me a moment as the realization washed over me.

"Does this mean I'm cured?" I asked in a hushed, hopeful voice. Dr. Aldersyde sat down next to me on the couch and smiled bashfully.

"Not quite, Miss Spade," he chortled, running a hand though his salt-and-pepper brown hair. "This is truly remarkable. Do you know how incredibly swift this recovery is coming along? Most patients that I've treated with this syndrome experience this sort of health three, four years after their diagnosis. You've been here six months and already your progress is unfathomable." He stopped, glancing at my gaping expression, and sighed. "What's driving you, Sam?" Dr. Aldersyde asked quietly.

"Huh?" I responded intelligently.

"The pure desire to just get out of a psyche facility can't be fuelling this recovery of yours," he explained, watching me to see my reaction. I closed my mouth finally and blinked. The question rolled over and over in my mind, but I honestly couldn't come up with any other answer except to heal my wounded pride, which is what I told him. He snorted and shook his head in dismissal. "Well, it's not for me to pry into that, I guess. It's just…I couldn't begin to imagine what sort of power your motivation is bringing you. Get some rest."

He stood up and the nurses returned to administer a small sea of pills to me. However, Dr. Aldersyde pointed to two or three of them and the nurse cleared them away into a small bottle. The nurse saw that I noticed the reduction of my medicine, and smiled. She said she almost felt like congratulating me. I said I almost felt like thanking her. Then, I froze when the attacker walked over to me, now redressed in a formal gray suit and tie. He stood next to the couch and removed the hat he wore.

"No hard feelings, miss," he muttered shyly. He offered a hand in apology and I was surprised by how gentle the beast that could have easily killed me really was. "I was only following orders." I managed a weak smile before he left the room. Then, I leaned back my head and rested against the pillows.

The doctor gave me the two weeks off to rest and spend as I pleased. He said that with the effort I showed him today, he was eager to get to work the next day or so, but understood that these things couldn't be rushed. However, as I watched his excited, jittery words sputter off of his scientifically fascinated lips, I knew we felt the same anxiousness to proceed.

When night fell and morning rose the next morning, I awoke at six thirty or so in anticipation of the day's ride. To my surprise, the nurse didn't come for me until nearly ten o' clock in the morning, informing me that today's therapy would be conducted in the clinic which disappointed me greatly. The prospect of spending hours inside a small, four-walled room with nothing but a doctor, a two-way mirror, and a giant poster which read "Bee Happy" with a smiling, cartoon bumble bee in the center for company, did not appeal to me. I removed my chaps in submission and tied a robe around the shorts and tee shirt I changed into.

"Good morning, Sam," Dr. Aldersyde greeted when the nurse had escorted me into the same white-washed room I had visualized. He did not look up from a chart on which I saw my name typed neatly in the right-hand corner for a few more moments and then only to release the nurse.

"I had to admit, Doctor, when I woke up I was expecting another trail ride, not a…" Dr. Aldersyde handed me a pair of large, cushiony earphones, cutting me off with a loud cough. I frowned at his uncharacteristic frostiness and took them from his hands.

"Please, lay back on the table," he instructed, pointing to the padded examination cot atop several drawers like a doctor's office. I obeyed and he rolled a mobile contraption of wires and knobs and switches until he and the thing were adjacent to where I lay. I was silent as he attached several cords and pressure-sensitive wires to my arms, temples, chest, and stomach. He indicated to the headphones and I put them on, trying to interpret his sudden change of mood.

"We'll be conducting a few tests on your memory today," he said simply. "Please relax and breathe deeply." That was all he said before he left the room and shut the door with a quiet _click_ behind him. I nervously glanced towards the mirror which I knew he stood behind, and leaned my head back on the pillow. I could hear nothing for a few seconds before a quiet whirring softly blocked out all other noise in the room. I almost felt compelled to utter a quick prayer, but the shock of color and sound which bombarded my mind caught me off guard and I was left stunned and unmoving.

From the earphones, a horrendous melody of whistling and an inhuman screeching triggered flashes of reds and blacks and whites and blues to streak across my mental vision. The sound was intense, and I felt my body twitching in an instinctive response to it. My face was contorted, and I wanted desperately to rip the paraphernalia off of my skin, but bit my bottom lip hard and held fast. More than anything, I wanted the colors and forms to take shape, to make sense, to be able to understand what the purpose was. It built inside of me a growing feeling of fear and apprehension that climaxed as a burning white film enveloped my mind before it suddenly faded away.

I panted as the white slid out of focus into a peaceful neutral setting. Then, it was as if someone had set up an antique movie reel inside my head. The colors took form and created pictures and scenes. Of my past, I noticed. I saw myself as a little girl in a play pool I had forgotten even existed until now. Glimpses of my mom and dad sitting in old, wooden recliners beneath an even more ancient oak, birthday candles with four, six, twelve, seventeen candles illuminating them, sleepovers, firsts and lasts, all there in front of me. It was almost pleasant to see them all, but my body was still tense as if bound in rigor. _There has to be something more_¸ I thought to myself suspiciously_, this can't be all…_

I never finished the thought process because a terrible scream ripped from my lips and I gripped the sides of the bed in a panic. The faces and images of friends and family shattered. Instead, a horrible nightmare unfolded in my mind. I heard the ricocheting _bangs_ of multiple guns erupting in my ears as a series of brutal flashbacks pressed against my mind. Except, they _weren't_ flashbacks. I'd never seen them before. One after another, I saw men, women, children, mothers, and babies…all smothered, shot, hung, or asphyxiated. Somehow, I managed to count them as they forced themselves painfully into view.

A man, hung from the ceiling of a log cabin in the woods, eyes wide and unseeing, blue veins pulsing to his face. _One._ A woman, her face covered by a blood spattered pillowcase, with a knife jutting out from her chest. _Two_. Another woman, black, surrounded by a murky blue darkness I took for water with blood pouring from a gunshot wound in her back. _Three._ A teenaged boy with bound hands and feet abandoned in a small, lightless shack, head forced into the mouth of a live gas oven. _Four._ A young girl smothered by a pillow sprawled on a small bed, naked except for a small, stained shift. _Five. _A man, face down in a plate of rotted food, poisoned. _Six. _Hispanic woman curled in a fetal position on an expensive marble floor, her neck twisted in a backwards, broken stance. _Seven. _An older man in his sixties sunk to the bottom of a murky, algae-infested pool, drowned. _Eight. _

I felt sweat pouring down my face, and I questioned how much more I could take of this before my heart exploded and I died, right there on that table. I searched through the chaos in my mind for another murder, but, as quickly as they had come on, the images quieted, and just a tired blackness reflected against my eyes. The sound ceased, and all was still. As I struggled to regain a steady control over my breathing and clench my hands together to stop their trembling, I heard the door open and the sounds of rushed footsteps over to where I lay.

"Get this goddamned thing off of me," I hissed in a tired but strangely relieved voice. He ripped the wires from my skin and handed me a damp towel to wipe my face with. I tried to sit up, but the exertion of the experiment had stripped me of all energy that remained inside of me. He jammed a long scroll of printout paper into my file and threw it on his desk. I opened my eyes and was offered a glass of cold water which I took readily, sipping the welcomingly cold liquid down my throat.

"I couldn't say anything to you before the procedure," he explained apologetically, standing back for a moment and watching me with a hushed awe and something like fear. "So as not to adulterate the results. Audiomemoria therapy. It's new. Eastern. It triggers memory with sound and portrays what the person is seeing on a digital screen linked to these wires. Not many doctors in the US use it because it can be so ineffective, but I had the idea to try it on you and…and…" He let the air whistle out from between a slight gap in his teeth. "Jesus Christ, Sam, what the hell have you been through?" I finally managed to sit up.

"Who were those people?" I asked in stronger yet still broken voice. Before he even told me, I knew the answer. Eight murders. Eight. _Eight._ Goddamn, did I know who they were. And when they happened. And how they came into my memory. And who did nothing to avenge them. Faintly, amid the rushing of blood I which pounded in my ears, I heard Dr. Aldersyde tell me that he believed these were the eight stimulants which triggered my attacks. Eight murders, he hurried on, that he believed all were climatically linked with the man in New York who had brought on the last one I had, but I was far ahead of him. What I needed was time to think.

Weakly, I smiled, and told him of this requirement before rushing out of the room and into a bathroom stall as nausea quickly overcame me.

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A/N: Well, you survived it, good. ;-D Sorry about the really abrupt ending, I've got lots more to add in the next chapter, but it was getting really late and I wanted to post something up because I don't know how hyper my computer is. (It erased like five articles I needed to hand into my page editor a couple days ago.) Reviews welcome! 


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's Note: **I'm sorry this hastaken so long to finally squeeze out. In truth I wrote it in like an hour, so if it seems rushed or full of grammatical errors, I apologize. I got really involved in my other stories for a while and forgot how much I enjoyed writing this one. Sam's character in this story is infused witha lot of my personality so forgive meif she strays from her usual demeanor.However, I do try to keep in mind the fact thatsix or seven months in a psychological facility would change anybody's attitudes and body language,Sam not excluded. So, here's chapter five and I hope to get asixth upin a shorter period of time than before.

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**Chapter5**

I asked my resident nurse for a notebook and the key to the library and quickly locked myself inside. Eight. The number resounded in my head over and over like a mantra and quickly fell in with my breathing. I drew a diagram on the first blank page, a large bubble with eight legs spanning out in all directions from it. In the large bubble I wrote _13 Months_ and in each leg I wrote a brief title for each murder I'd seen. I burned a callus onto my emotions and wrote each description dispassionately.

"They started thirteen…no,_ nineteen_ months ago," I murmured out loud, scribbling madly. "Eight murders, and they were all in the city. I recognized Central Park somewhere…The first, the man in the cabin. What was his name? It was a cabin, an empty cabin." My hand raked the pen along paper, forming a small rough sketch of a cabin. "What was his name? Shit, think Sam."

I concentrated and brought the image back into my mind, but with it I heard the faint singing of birds in the background. I saw red splashes of color around the man's chest. Blood? No, it wasn't blood. They were all centrally at his …

"Hart! Robin Hart!" I shouted, and a few other patients jumped in their corners of the library. My hand shook a little as I wrote the name 'Robin Hart' on the diagram. Flashes of cryptic memory played with the image in my head and I translated them as fast as I could. "It was cold, winter, Christmas Eve…discovered by his girlfriend, married."

Hesitating slightly I summoned the second image into my head and the woman on a white bed in what looked like a nice hotel room swirled into vision. Her right hand was surrounded by a halo of light and I shook my head disbelievingly. "Julie Wright." I searched for signs of the weather like before but instead I only heard or rather saw the tolling of bells in the distance. "Found by her husband—" (there was a gold band on her finger) "—stabbed to death…on her _wedding_ night."

"Jesus Christ," I muttered, squeezing my eyes shut to grasp the next victim. The black woman, shot in the back and submerged in water eagerly leapt forward. My forehead wrinkled in disgust as the area around her pelvis shone white against her dark skin. It was bruised, tainted…the smell of familiar, sharp liquor teased my senses. Familiar, Jack, Jack and I,_ where are you, Jack?_ Jack… "Jack Daniels! Shirley! Shirley Daniels! Prostitute who got it in the back and ... and…traffic? Car alarms, brakes are screeching… Of _course_! She was thrown off the Brooklyn Bridge postmortem."

By now, the patients around me were begging, pleading with juvenile whimpers to their nurses to escape my madness. I saw the boy, his head hidden from view as it was jammed into a gas oven, hands and feet bound. "Who are you?" I said to myself. "Tell me…"

There was fog, lots of fog, and at first I assumed it represented the gas, but no, this was different. It was fog, perfect thickness and swirling like in the movies. _Beautiful relationship. Sam, we've got a beautiful relationship…Sam, you're my beginning…so beautiful_. "What the hell?" I wrote down the words on the page and stared at them in confusion until suddenly it became so clear and so clichéd I wanted to laugh. "'Sam, this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.' _Casablanca_. It's from _Casablanca_…but what…why?" I stared at the boy's shape and it glowed as the fog cleared slightly. Something caught in the corner of the image, in his hands. "A crucifix? No, no, there's no body on it. It's a cross. His father…was a reverend. Episcopalian Reverend. Reverend…" _Sam, beautiful beinnings…_ "Reverend Bogart! Harold Bogart. Harold, Harold, Harold…" I scribbled his name down along with the description of his death.

Bolder now, I dragged the next murder into my mind, the girl in the bed with a pillow smashed on her face. There was someone else, behind the little bed. Not a complete person, just a hand, just a hand with an extended finger that curled toward the palm, commanding, ordering, beckoning, beckoning me to come closer. "Beckoning…beckoning…beck—Becca! Becca Smart! Okay, okay…got it, now who is she? What did she do?"

The image faded. "No! No, wait! Who are you? Who are you, baby?" I saw a glowing gold band where her body used to be. Two bands, like cells in meiosis the gold band divided into two, linked together, inside one another as only a magician could make them become. Suddenly, the bands snapped and broke into two, shattering and only the first original band hovered over Becca's body. "I don't understand..."

It was if my memory was agitated, impatient with my brain for its slowness for the sequence of actions with the bands repeated itself again and again until suddenly I understood. "Her parents were married…then divorced, and she lives with only one…her father?" There was a blinding flash of light that made me recoil, and I realized I was wrong. "The mother, she lived with the mother." I paused for a second. "Did—did my brain just _punish _me?"

The sixth murder came into my mind without my urging. The well-dressed man face down in a plate of food, his expression green and the familiar poison bones tattooed against his skin. Poisoned. The squealing and screaming of sea birds greeted my senses. Sea birds battling each other for bits of his food, angry, fighting sea birds. Seagulls. Gray and huddled into an animated mass of feathers… "SEGAL! Ben Segal, poisoned with rat poisoning, found by his wife…who he loved…Susan." The wedding bands were whole in my vision, held together by what seemed to be an unbreakable, glowing bond. "They were happy, weren't they? Yes, they were very happy…"

As the seventh murder burst into my head, I heard the screams of small children, the smells of frying beans, refried beans, seasoning, screaming, so much to do, so much work, overwhelmingly loud children crying and pulling at her broken body. A husband who knelt by her, tears in his eyes, but he unbuckled his pants and pulled at her waist expectantly. I didn't need prodding for her name, her husband called it as he whined for her attentions. "Maria Nuñez. Mother of…well, one, two, three, four, five…five, mother of five. Someone broke her neck, she must have fallen." I felt the beginnings of the reproachful blinding light and changed my answer. "Okay, okay, someone … fell on her?" No light. "

While I was writing the information on this woman, my pen froze. Maria Nuñez. Her name was familiar, and not as in the weird, ethereal way that my mind recognized familiarities in these murders, but an actual memory, separate from the images. My case files, my cases. She was a missing person a few years back. Case went cold when the only lead we had, her mother, died in her sleep before we could talk to her. She abandoned her children and her husband, I said in the report. Looking at the screaming chaos in my mind, I now understood why, but before I could spend more time pondering, the eighth and final murder sprang into view.

The old man hung in a slumped position in his ill-kept pool, algae beginning to cling to his body. Dollar bills floated down like green paper birds from the sky and I tried to count how many, maybe he had a lot of money. They came down like snow so fast and in such great numbers that I quickly lost count and gave up. Wait, they were all one dollar bills. Why was that significant? United States, Treasury, _E Pluribus Unum_, George Washington… Something struck a chord in my mind. "George. George Darwin, aged 69. Drowned in his pool." I found myself looking at his hand, and realized it was bare except for a faceless watch that was blurred to indicate its unimportance. "Unmarried."

I threw down my pen and slid back from the table on my rolling chair. Eight unsolved murders glared back at me with eyes of glittering black cursive. I was out of breath, I realized, and took a few minutes to regain composure before scooting back to the desk. At the bottom of the messy web, I connected all the lines to a single vertex and from it I drew one last line. I hesitated, then wrote the man's name, the man who Dr. Aldersyde believed triggered my final "episode." _Paul Mathers._

Damn, I need to be back in New York. I need to see Jack. I need background information, case files, interrogation reports, and especially Paul Mathers. I looked around the empty library and sighed. I need to get out of here before I go stir-crazy. My arms locked mid-stretch and the irony of what I had thought brought a sarcastic grin to my lips. I stood up and took the wrinkled notebook with me. It gave me a strange comfort, hope that maybe I wasn't as crazy as they'd took me for. A sudden hatred for my coworkers in New York poisoned my relief. They hadn't even done as much as visited me. Just tucked me a way in a little clinic in Winchester, never to be thought of again. I knew I was being over-dramatic but I didn't care. As a lunatic, I guess that was my prerogative.

I unlocked the library door and shuffled down the hallway, looking for Dr. Aldersyde's office. As I lifted my hand to knock on the door I yawned again and itched my nose. The bright fluorescent lights that had once instilled a deathly panic in my bones now seemed dull and powerless. It's amazing what knowledge of one's mind and self can do for your confidence. And it's quite a unique feeling to be at your brain's employ. The reproachful glares and undeniable impatience of my memories made me wonder whether I was either extremely brilliant or extremely disturbed. Maybe, after all this was over, maybe I _would_ go in for a few appointments with my shrink every now and then. I'm sure Martin would appreciate that; he thinks I'm a crack head enough as it is…where the hell is Aldersyde?

I banged louder on his office door until a nurse touched my shoulder and I stopped. "Do you need something, dear?" I wanted to punch her in the face, I really did. This place, this "institute" really did a number on my nerves, and I realized if I ever got back on the job, I would be a much different agent.

"I'm looking for Dr. Aldersyde," I said as politely as my clamped jaw would allow. She checked a clipboard hanging from her neck. Running her finger down what seemed to be a list, she tapped a spot on the paper with her pen.

"He's at lunch until 1:30, dear," she answered in a syrupy voice. Lunch? At a time like this? Lunch? Well, I…I…well, what kind of lunch?

"Okay, thank you," I told her and walked off towards the cafeteria, my stomach gleefully entertaining the thought of a giant rotisserie chicken, but the nurse caught up with me. "No, it's okay, I know where I'm going."

"Do you have permission to be out of your room, dear?" I stared at her blankly. "Can you hear me, young lady?"

"Yeah, yeah, I hear you. No, I don't. I was in the library doing some research for Dr. Alder—hey!" She yanked the notebook from my hands and looked at the manic sketches I drew. Her face grew pale and her lips parted in horror as I realized what sort of crazed lunatic I probably seemed like with the eight murders articulately drawn out in a diagram. "No, it's not what you think. Can I have that back—I can explain everything if you just…"

She held it away from me and brought a walkie-talkie to her lips. "Security, I need security. We've got a rogue patient here with homicidal tendencies, bring the suit. I'll try to secure her for the time being but she could be hostile."

I groaned. "Jesus Christ, lady, just give me back the notebook, and I'll explain. Where's Dr. Aldersyde? He'd have a stroke if he saw what you're doing here." She pinned me against the wall and my blonde hair caught painfully under her left arm while the right was held under my chin so that I could barely breathe.

"And who's Paul Mathers, hmm? Your next victim?" Her white face was hot with excitement and fear as I squirmed under her grasp. "Security! Over here! Security! " Out of the corner of my eye, I saw three giant men sweep me into arms ripped with bulging muscle as my own arms were forced into a sickeningly familiar white jacket. I didn't squirm and instead stood there stock still while they apprehended their so-called dangerous fugitive. "Oh, for the love of God! This is ridiculous!"

"Stay calm, ma'am," a huge black guy said, sticking a syringe into my arm. "Just stay calm."

I glared at him sarcastically and leaned against him. "Well, hold me, goddammit, I'm going to conk out in like three seconds and my head has sustained enough injury with Hulk Hogan over here…" The nurse pursed her lips and sniffed. Three seconds passed, and sure enough, with very little grace, so did I.


End file.
